DC's odds and ends

ODDS and ENDS
...

ODDS and ENDS

#TRADEOFFS

According to recent reports General Motors will "formally
petition" NASCAR to adopt ethanol fuels for its race series.

Thus count GM as being among those wanting to drastically reduce the
nasty gases being spewed into the Earth's atmosphere because of the
perception of arising global problems that, so far, have yet to be
conclusively proven.

(While the "weight of the evidence" has dictated mass alert,
or Chicken Little en masse, remember that going free today are a number
of guys convicted by weighty evidence like eyewitness testimony --
"That's him over there, your Honor, he did it" --
after wrongly spending decades behind bars. So spare me subjective and
non sequitur "he said" e-mails, please.)

Besides, whether one accepts the atmospheric premise or rejects it
isn't the point herein. It's the cost of the change to
ethanol use. Here are some thoughts along those lines:

In April the federal government issued new air quality regulations that
immediately allow ethanol plants to emit more than twice the previously
allowed volume of air pollutants without triggering the air quality
permit restrictions imposed on other smokestack industries. That means
ethanol plants now qualify as "minor emitters" while each
year legally spewing up to 250 million gallons of atmospheric pollutants.
With "exception" permits, they'll be able to emit even more - and which
plant would be denied such a permit should the general public scream for
"more" fuel?

According to Minnesota's Pollution Control Agency, one St. Paul
ethanol plant's pollutants included carbon monoxide, methanol,
toluene, formaldehyde and acetaldehyde -- the latter two known to
cause cancer in animals.

In 2007 the U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates 12.2-billion bushels
of corn will be grown, of which 3.2-billion bushels (about 180-billion
lbs.) will be directed to ethanol production resulting in about 3-billion
gallons (about 25-billion lbs.) of motor fuel.

However, compared to gasoline, ethanol is only 70-percent as efficient,
thereby meaning those 3 billion gallons of ethanol will last about 36
days instead of gasoline's per-gallon equivalent of 52 days.

Though present U.S. ethanol refining capacity lacks, even if all
12.2-billion bushels of annual U.S. corn production were redirected to
refining ethanol the supply would last roughly 150 days, based on Feb.
2007 gasoline-use statistics provided by the federal Energy Information
Administration.

Put another way: using the entire present U.S. corn crop for ethanol,
fuel production would be about 40-percent of that presently used each day
by the average driver. Talk about high gas prices.

Furthermore, U.S. farmers are very unlikely to produce enough product to
meet President George W. Bush's goal of consuming 35-billion gallons
(132-billion liters) of alternative fuels every year by 2017 - a
500-percent increase over current requirements. Can you say
"continuing trade imbalance?"

And what of opposite and equal?

With the entire corn crop redirected to fuel production, gone entirely
would be food, pharmaceuticals and the literally thousands of products
used daily made from corn in whole or part, not to mention the jobs
making, distributing and selling those products. Never mind the impact
it'd have on the financial and real estate markets.

While farming land will go up in price - therefore ultimately making corn
production even more expensive - one very real possible consequence of
job loss is a real estate foreclosure of that former worker's home.

Most important of all, my 1966 Mustang 2+2 K-code probably won't be
ethanol adaptable, unless I change out most of the original
engine's fuel system. What's the point in having a classic if
it can't be a classic? Gee whiz, I can see it now: "Mad Max,
USA."

That ethanol is cleaner-burning than petroleum distillates is a proven
and in the usage of which I've got no problem.

But let us not believe it a panacea, either - like GM and others
evidently are beginning to think.

JUST ABOUT THE TIME . . .

... One thinks 30-year-old FABCAR is just about gone from the Rolex
Series comes word another team will be running FABCAR's new and improved
(with more to come) Daytona Prototype.

The No. 39 Crown Royal Special Porsche-FABCAR out of the (Eddie) Cheever
Racing stables is the lone FABCAR now competing in the series. Driven by
Christian Fittipaldi and Harrison Brix, the car has shown consistent
improvement since quiet-spoken Scotsman Iain Watt has exerted his design
influence beginning earlier this year.

The team, which will be switching to the FABCAR from another DP
constructor (indeed, having two such cars), is undertaking preparations
and should be testing within the next six weeks or so. The engine? BMW.

RUMOR MILL

A couple of interesting rumors floated around the Rolex Series'
Virginia International Raceway paddock last week.

1. The combination provides Finlay with the "technical
resources needed" to be competitive in the series; or,

2. The team is waiting to ascertain the
"direction" taken by the new five-year DP plan, effective in
2008; or,

3. Dissension within Finlay concerning allocation of former
engineer's Rick Cameron's split attention between son
Dane's (an upcoming, talented driver) career and that devoted to
Finlay Motorsports; or,

4. Finlay Motorsports' ARCA program is sucking up the
available resources.

Whatever, now out of a job are a bunch of team members who earlier this
year moved with the team from the West Coast to the East Coast.

On another front, Grand Am and IMSA/ALMS were rumored to be engaged in
buyout discussions of the latter by the former.

"That's a crock," NASCAR vice-chair and Grand-Am
co-founder Jim France said when asked about it.